Rotunda at Potters Park

Potters Park is at the junction of Balmoral road and Dominion Road.

When the kids little before we went to Singapore, we lived in Mt eden Road. I used to push Gin the push chair, and Dwould walk. Later when Dwas in kindy, we would go to Potters park and have a play in the playground, a picnic lunch at the Rotunda and feed the pigeons.

I always have a pang of nostalgia when I go past. They now have a Plunket room as well. The Plunket nurses have been very good to me as I was a young mother without any immediate family. During the annual collection drive, I helped them by knocking on houses for donation.

The Royal New Zealand Plunket Society is an incorporated society in New Zealand which provides a range of health services to healthy babies and young children. The Plunket Society mission is "to ensure that New Zealand children are among the healthiest in the world".

The society is most commonly referred to in the community as "Plunket".


History

The meeting which led to the foundation of the society was held on May 14, 1907 by Dr Frederick Truby King. King was a medical superintendent and lecturer in mental diseases. He believed that by providing support services to parents, the society could ensure children were fed on a nutritious diet, and therefore reduce child mortality rates. He also believed that this would improve adult health as the children got older.

Within a year, the society had first opened The Karitane Home For Babies in Dunedin, and then opened centres in Auckland, Wellington, and Christchurch.

The society was initially established to cater only for European women and their babies. However this was changed from political opposition and protest from various groups such as the Maori Women's Initiative.[citation needed]

Originally called the "Royal New Zealand Society for the Health of Women and Children", Plunket got its name from an early patron of the Society, Victoria Plunket, mother of eight and wife of then Governor, William Plunket.

In 1912, King made a lecture tour on the Plunket Society. In these tours he was highly successful in attracting support for the society, partly because he exaggerated the effect on infant mortality rates. As a result of his tour, 60 new centres opened around New Zealand, each employing a nurse. The centres were (and are) badged as Plunket Rooms

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plunket_Society